I give up on Bluecor... Not available in Canada...

I've searched, and searched and searched in every, and I mean EVERY &?@*@ Hardware shop, Home improvement shop, siding shop... They all looked at me as if I was a Martian...

I explained to them what Bluecor or Protection Board III as its also called was and what it was used for but they all tried to sell me rolls of bubble paper coated with aluminium... GRRR !!!

I called the DOW Canada cutomer service, the only help they were able to give me was a contact at Weyehauser Canada but this guy told me "we're not selling this in Canada".

So I give up, I wont be able to find the product anywhere near.

I'm down to a few options now:

-Drive to United States, which is a couple of hours from here and try to find some there... If I can't find it, it will be a 4 hours round trip for nothing...

-Buy 3" Blue foam board and slice it in 1/4" sheets. Tried that already with pink foam but couldn't get straight panels, every single sheet I did "bowed"... Blue foam board didn't have the same texture as pink foam though, I'm wondering if it would make a difference...

-Use foam posterboard, Hunt Bienfang, 20"x30" at 10 for 30$CAD.

-Quit Foam building... NO !!!!!

-Ask someone from this board to generousely ship a Bluecor bundle down here all cost paid by myself... But I fear the shipping cost would be pretty high with the size of the package...

Anyways, if someone has any solutions to propose...

If anyone from Vermont found some Bluecor, let me know as I'm pretty near from Vermont here.

Hummmmmmmm!

3. If so, are contractors and homeowners north of the border interested in having the same advantages as those south of the border.

4. Bring some of it into Canada and take it to a distributor who could possibly corner the entire Canadian market as a distributor for it.

5. Homes north of the border are just not that much different than those south of the border.

6. Is there some trade barrier reason that it is not available here.

7. If Home Depot in US have it .....could a HD here get some sent in to see how it is received. Maybe you will have to tell them what we want it for and as a community service they will get you some so long as you repay them with some good words in the local press. Another way to skin a cat? (Heck of an expression!)

Never Give Up!

NetForce2k,
Don't give up! I have an entire chapter of the Fan-Fold guide dedicated to helping people find Bluecor. Your struggle could help save countless hours of frustration for those who come after.

I'd be happy to ship you a bundle. I happen to live 1/4 mile from a Lowe's that regularly stocks Bluecor. Feel free to get in touch, I'll find out how much a bundle is going for these days, and we can sort out the shipping costs if you like. I don't want you to be left out of the fun I'm having.

I don't recommend cutting the regular foam into 1/4" sheets. That is great if you're going to be glassing it, or sheeting some other structure, but I've found that the thick foam is less plyable, and of course missing the skin that comes with the Bluecor.

So, the options in the guide, and feel free to email me: Hippo@FoamFly.com or call (734) 528-9446 x1

Good Luck,
-Dan

P.S. I live about 30 Minutes from the Detroit/Windsor tunnel. If you do ever drive down, let me know, we should get in touch.

There are a lot of ways to come by the fan-fold foam, and you may have to spend some time with your telephone directory to find it. Don't give up. While the Sturdy Board, foam core board, and solid insulation foam are nice options to have, you'll get a lot more done, more quickly and for less money, if you have the real stuff. Okay, so where?

Depending on where you're located in the country (or the world) it may be as easy as heading down the street to your local "Lowe's" or "Home Depot" store. I find that in the mid-west, Lowe's carries the Dow/Georgia Pacific products (the blue stuff), and Home Depot carries the Owens Corning products (the pink stuff). It varies regionally, so check all the stores. Pactiv Building Supplies makes the green foam. My personal recommendation is for the blue fan-fold. It has the extra skin on it for strength, and is the lowest density of all the fan-fold options. Both the Dow and Owens Corning websites have dealer listings where you can search for stores in your area that carry, or can order the foam. Dow offers the foam under two different product names: "BlueCor", and "High Performance Underlayment." The official Owens Corning product name is actually "FanFold Foam Residing Board." The Pactiv product name is "GreenGuard," and their fan-fold brand is "Amocor" or "NP-14 Underlayment."

In addition to checking with your nearest jumbo home-improvement center, also call contractors and installers who deal with vinyl or aluminum siding, and Commercial Roofing contractors too. I found a siding contractor who had four pallets of the foam, but he only knew it as "underlayment." So, it pays to be persistent and describe what you're looking for in terms that they will understand. If they want to know why you're buying (what seems to them) so little of it, then you can explain about the model airplanes. Trust me, if you mention model planes first, you'll just get blank stares.

If that doesn't make you feel weird enough, you can try hanging around at construction sites where that kind of work is going on. There's usually a lot of scrap left over and if you offer to carry it away, you can get it free. I don't recommend carrying away (stealing) pre-scrap foam, but maybe if you ask politely enough, they can spare some.

But, what if you live in California, or (insert your state here) where they don't have much siding, and have little use for insulation? Okay, this is where those giant home improvement stores really come in handy. If you go to the customer service desk, and ask nicely, they will happily find products from any of their other stores, and ship them back and forth all over the county at no charge to you! That's right, most of us wouldn't want to even calculate the shipping cost on a 8 lb., 4 Cubic foot bundle of foam, and these folks are volunteering to do it for free. There is of course a catch. You have to be able to tell them what you want to buy, and often to prove that the other stores actually carry this item. (In some cases they might not even believe such a thing exists…) I have posted the barcode from my local Lowe's on www.FoamFly.com under "What is Fan-Fold Foam?" This should be enough information for any Lowe's in the country to order some for you.

Still can't find any? Get on the phone to your nearest Dow or Georgia Pacific sales rep. Be friendly, make them send you free samples. Somebody there must know what you're talking about. Dow has their own model flying club. All the planes are, of course, built from blue foam. Talk about having access at the source.

If you're getting discouraged by this time, hope is not completely lost. I will send you some. I don't even want to think about the volumetric shipping costs, (and probably neither do you) but I don't want to leave anybody out in the cold. So, send me a personal email at: Hippo@FoamFly.com and I will do what I can to help. Even then, all is not lost. You can of course now consider the various other types of sheet foam that I've mentioned.

Sturdy Board, or foam core board, can be found at almost any art supply store, office supply store, Meijer, Kmart, or Walmart. The only way you can lose with this stuff, is if you get caught soaking off the paper in the bathtub, and your spouse decides you've finally flipped. Depron, and Zepron can be ordered online, from Peck Polymers, and Airdyn.com respectively. Those options cost a bit more though. Don't forget to ask your local grocery store for extra "meat trays" and save foam carry out containers when you eat out. All these substitutes will come in small sheets, so you'll have to use a little creativity when building with them.

If you look hard enough, you will find plenty of material at hand to get you started on you way to proudly flying your own hand made masterpiece.
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I gave up too some time ago. Even tried some of the flooring people, as I'd heard there was some sub-flooring insulation that was similar. All I found was some thin and flimsy big cell type of foam, which was useless.

Slicing thin foam does't work so well if it's the extruded type, as there is some residual stresses from the fabrication process that will make it warp & twist.

Depron would be nice if it was available locally. So I'm resigned to scrubbing foamboard for my models.

Don't be discouraged. (OK to be frustrated) Hippo has offered a lot of good ways to get your hands on the real stuff. Living in Slick Rock, Idaho I too had a devil of a time finding fanfold. Ended up with the green stuff. Just to get going, I bought sturdyboard from Wallyworld at 2.00 a sheet. Getting the paper off wasn't too bad, but the foam has very little strength. I compensated by using Kevlar thread, anywhere from 3-7 strands glued to the LE and TE, or any place else I thought needed strengthening. Is this the perfect answer? No. But it does allow you to cut out parts and get a plane built while you search for the Holy Grail. You can find kevlar thread at an archery shop, or fishing tackle outlet. Carbon fiber tape or tow could even be found at your LHS if you're lucky. I've even used polyester thread from the fabric store, although it stretches more than kevlar. It's amazing what desperation can do! Don't take NO for an answer. By all means, check out the offerings at www.foamfly.com. When Dan gets the big guide out there is going to be a lot more foam in the air!

I used to work for Dow Chemical on a Styrofoam plant when I was a student (My dad still works there). They are manufacturing a thousand of different products on that production line, but nothing like bluecore.
I guess the canadian market doesn't need that product... I have even checked with the Sarnia prod. plant and they don't produce it either

Well Hippo guide is surely very helpful for the US, but as I said, even the DOW Canada customer service wasn't able to identify any suppliers in CANADA, not just my region but the whole country !

And as Markz said, he worked there and never saw that product around the plant.

I mean its pretty hard to find the product when DOW itself doesn't know about any Canadian supplier...

I even talked with the sales manager of Weyerhaeuser, which is the prime supplier of DOW product in Canada and the guy knew what Bluecor (or Protection board 3) was but he confirmed me that they didn't sell that to anyone in Canada. He says that the product is barely know here in Canada.

I still have the travel to US option, but without being 100% sure to come back with a bundle, I'm not too sure I want to make the trip to Main...

Hippo as offered to ship some here, that would be an option BUT... I went on the UPS website and did a quote for a 48"x24"x12"x8lbs package... result: around 45$ Shipping !!!

So 45$ shipping + around 30$ a bundle = 75$ US (110$ CAD). A bit expensive for me, and if my girlfriend know that, she kills me for sure ;-)

Thanks a lot for the offer though Hippo, I'm really glad some people are trying to help us Canadians to try and get some.

Well either do it yourself, or try to talk a LHS into it, as they should know how to deal with importing stuff from the US, and may be able to stock it up on their premises. How about someone like Great Hobbies?

No home depot I know of has the blue fan fold. Lowes seems to be the best chance. A friend found some for me at a New York Lowes. I found out after that there was a Vermont company that supposedly carried it. I haven't quite run out yet so I don't have visual proof that they do, but they did say so:

fanfold

don't you know someone in the "states"who lives close and can just toss a bundle over the border in the middle of the night, God knows, they do it with everything else. If I lived closer I'd do it!!!!!! Can't anybody help out a fellow modeler??????